Helen Foxhall FORBES

Position
Full Professor
Roles
Member of the Centre's Scientific Committee "NICHE Centre for Environmental Humanities"
Telephone
041 234 9850
E-mail
helenfoxhall.forbes@unive.it
Academic discipline
Medieval History [HIST-01/A]
Website
https://www.unive.it/web/en/19197/people/helenfoxhall.forbes(personal record)
Office
Department of Humanities
Website: https://www.unive.it/dep.humanities
Where: Malcanton Marcorà

Teaching activity current year

STUDI ITALIANI E MEDITERRANEI [FTR6]
Laurea

STUDI STORICI: ETÀ MEDIEVALE, MODERNA, CONTEMPORANEA [FMR7]
Laurea magistrale (DM270)

Teaching activity previous years

STORIA DAL MEDIOEVO ALL'ETÀ CONTEMPORANEA [FM7]
Laurea magistrale (DM270)

STUDI STORICI: ETÀ MEDIEVALE, MODERNA, CONTEMPORANEA [FMR7]
Laurea magistrale (DM270)

STORIA DAL MEDIOEVO ALL'ETÀ CONTEMPORANEA [FM7]
Laurea magistrale (DM270)

STORIA DAL MEDIOEVO ALL'ETÀ CONTEMPORANEA [FM7]
Laurea magistrale (DM270)

Activities and research skills

Academic discipline
Storia medievale [HIST-01/A]
Settore Scientifico Disciplinare (SSD) affine
STORIA DEL CRISTIANESIMO E DELLE CHIESE [M-STO/07]
Geographic areas in which the research experience mainly applies
Internazionale: Europa, Africa Caraibi e Pacifico
Known languages
inglese (scritto: madrelingua parlato: madrelingua)
tedesco (scritto: avanzato parlato: avanzato)
italiano (scritto: avanzato parlato: avanzato)
francese (scritto: intermedio parlato: base)
Participation in editorial boards of scientific journals/book series
Knowledge, Scholarship and Science in the Middle Ages: Brepols, https://www.brepols.net/series/KSS
Participation as referees of national and international research projects
Referee: Arts and Humanities Research Council (United Kingdom)
Referee: UK Innovation and Research (United Kingdom)
Referee: Arts and Humanities Research Council (United Kingdom) and Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Germany) Joint Scheme
Main departmental research areas and fields
Area: Ambiente Linea: Clima
Area: Archeologia ed arti Linea: Arte contemporanea
Area: Beni culturali Linea: Valorizzazione di beni culturali
Area: Economia Linea: Sistema economico - politiche e gestione
Area: Religioni e filosofie Linea: Religioni e filosofie - Cina e Giappone
Area: Storia e Antropologia Linea: Antropologia
Area: Storia e Antropologia Linea: Storia del cristianesimo
Area: Storia e Antropologia Linea: Storia delle civiltà antiche
Area: Storia e Antropologia Linea: Storia medievale
Area: Studi culturali Linea: Studi culturali
Commentary on C. Norman et al. 2025. Droughts and conflicts during the late Roman period, Climatic Change 178:87 (article submitted to Climatic Change)
SSD:
M-STO/01
Other members of the research group:
Michele ABBALLE
Vasiliki MANOLOPOULOU
Jakub SYPIAŃSKI
Fire of love: purgatory in late antiquity (monograph, contracted to Oxford University Press)
SSD:
M-STO/01
Gregory the Thinker: experimentum in the De cursibus ecclesiasticis of Gregory of Tours (book chapter)
SSD:
M-STO/01
Prayer for the dead and relocation of purgatorial fire in the seventh century (article invited for a special issue of Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum)
SSD:
M-STO/01
The Dialogues of Gregory the Great (translation and introductory essay, contracted to Liverpool University Press as part of the Translated Texts for Historians Series)
SSD:
M-STO/01
The sea-coloured sun and the volcanic eruption of 535CE (article for submission to a journal)
SSD:
M-STO/01
Other members of the research group:
Michele ABBALLE
Vasiliki MANOLOPOULOU
Jakub SYPIAŃSKI
NICHE Centre For Environmental Humanities
Funding body:
THE NEW INSTITUTE
Type:
Altri finanziamenti per progetti di ricerca
Role in the project:
LD
Sito di progetto:
https://www.unive.it/pag/44234/
Starting date:
Year: 2021 Length in months: 72
Other members of the research group:
Sara CULEDDU
Enrica DE CIAN
Francesco GONELLA
Pietro Daniel OMODEO
Roberta RAFFAETA'
Francesca TAROCCO
Fabiana ZOLLO
SSE1K: Science, Society and Environmental Change in the First Millennium CE
Funding body:
ERC
Type:
H2020 - Excellence Science - ERC
Role in the project:
LD
Starting date:
Year: 2023 Length in months: 60

Publication highlights

Foxhall Forbes, Helen; Fafinski, Mateusz; Halsall, Guy; Harland, James M.; Lawrence, Dan; Clarke-Neish, Kelly; Foxhall, Lin; Abballe, Michele; Borroni, Massimiliano; Lypiridou, Ismini; Manolopoulou, Vicky; Nikulina, Anastasia; Sypiański, Jakub; Fleitmann, Dominik Drought, Conflict and the Use of Historical Data and Methodologies in Interdisciplinary Palaeoclimatic Research in CLIMATIC CHANGE, vol. 179 (ISSN 0165-0009)
DOI 2026, Journal Article - ARCA card: 10278/5114790


Foxhall Forbes, Helen OLD ENGLISH ÆLMES/ÆLMYSSE AS ‘MERITORIOUS DEED’ in NOTES AND QUERIES, vol. 73, pp. 3-6 (ISSN 0029-3970)
DOI 2026, Journal Article - ARCA card: 10278/5111667


Foxhall Forbes, Helen Creating Knowledge and Knowing Creation in Theological and Scientific Writing in Late Antique Western Christendom , The Intellectual World of Late Antique Christianity: Reshaping Classical Traditions, Cambridge University Press, pp. 705-728 (ISBN 9781108835299)
DOI 2023, Book Article - ARCA card: 10278/5043464


John Robb; Meredith S. Chesson; Hamish Forbes; Lin Foxhall; Helen Foxhall Forbes; Paula Kay Lazrus; Kostalena Michelaki; Alfonso Picone Chiodo; David Yoon The Twentieth Century Invention of Ancient Mountains: The Archaeology of Highland Aspromonte in INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HISTORICAL ARCHAEOLOGY, vol. 25, pp. 14-44 (ISSN 1092-7697)
DOI 2020, Journal Article - ARCA card: 10278/5015245


Forbes, Helen Foxhall Writing on the Wall: Anglo-Saxons at Monte Sant'Angelo sul Gargano (Puglia) and the Spiritual and Social Significance of Graffiti in JOURNAL OF LATE ANTIQUITY, vol. 12, pp. 169-210 (ISSN 1939-6716)
DOI 2019, Journal Article - ARCA card: 10278/5011829


List of publications

Curriculum vitae

Helen Foxhall Forbes is professor of medieval history and PI of the research project Science, Society and Environmental Change in the First Millennium CE (SSE1K, ERC Grant Agreement 101044437), a Consolidator Grant funded by the European Research Council (ERC).

She studied Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at the University of Cambridge (2001-2008) and Theology at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität, Freiburg-im-Breisgau (2007-2008). Subsequently she held posts at the universities of Cambridge (2008-2009), Leicester (2009-2012), Exeter (2012-2013) and Durham (2013-2022).

Her research focuses on Europe and the Mediterranean from late antiquity to the early middle ages. Her particular research interests include environmental history and the links between human beings and their environments, the history of Christianity and of Christian theology, as well as intellectual history and the history of science. 

Her first book, Heaven and Earth in Anglo-Saxon England: Theology and Society in an Age of Faith (2013), was funded by a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship held at the University of Leicester. This research demonstrated the important connections between theology and its social context in early medieval England.

She is currently completing two books on purgatory in late antiquity and the early middle ages (Fire of Love: purgatory in the late antique imagination, and Fire of Hope: purgatory in early medieval Europe, to be published with Oxford University Press. In addition she is preparing an English translation of the Dialogues of Gregory the Great for Liverpool University Press, in the Translated Texts for Historians series.

She welcomes book proposals for the Brepols series, Knowledge, Scholarship and Science in the Middle Ages, of which she is General Editor.

She is a member of the Bova Marina Archaeological Project and has been involved with excavations in Calabria since 1999.

She is also a member of the international advisory board for the Richard Rawlinson Center for Anglo-Saxon Studies and Manuscript Research (Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI) and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

ORCID ID: 0000-0003-3385-3272

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